03 May 2013 Press releases

GvW Graf von Westphalen advises investors on acquisition of Burger King GmbH

Yi-Ko Holding GmbH has acquired wholly-owned subsidiary Burger King GmbH with corporate seat in Munich as well as 91 company-owned BURGER KING® restaurants from the BURGER KING® group. The joint shareholders of Yi-Ko Holding GmbH are the investors Ergün Yildiz and Alexander Kolobov, who was advised on this transaction by GvW Graf von Westphalen. A component of the transaction is the obligation of the two investors to remodel 57 of the fast food chain's restaurants within the next one and a half years and to open a substantial number of new BURGER KING® restaurants in Germany over the course of the next five years.

Yi-Ko Holding GmbH with corporate seat in Stade was incorporated by the two shareholders Ergün Yildiz and Alexander Kolobov specifically for the acquisition of Burger King GmbH. Both shareholders are already BURGER KING® franchisees and have many years of experience with the operation of restaurant chains. For instance, Alexander Kolobov has been the driving force behind the spectacular expansion of BURGER KING® restaurants in Russia during the past three years. Ergün Yildiz has been a successful BURGER KING® franchisee for over ten years in Germany.

With more than 13,000 restaurants in 88 countries and more than 11 million customers per day, BURGER KING® is the world's second largest fast food chain. In Germany BURGER KING® works with around 170 franchise partners, of which 75 % are family businesses.

Led by Hamburg partner Dr Dominik Ziegenhahn, Alexander Kolobov was advised by a team of lawyers from the US law firm Chadbourne & Parke (Moskow) and GvW Graf von Westphalen (Hamburg and Frankfurt). Ergün Yildiz was advised by Dr Dieter Stummel (Cologne) who was head of Burger King's legal department for Central Europe until 2006.

Chadbourne & Parke: Konstantin Konstantinov and Jeff Browne (both corporate/M&A, Moscow).

GvW: Dr Dominik Ziegenhahn (lead partner), Dr Ritesh Rajani, LL.M. (both corporate/ M&A, Hamburg), Dr Frank Tschesche, LL.M. (tax law, Frankfurt), Christian Esch, LL.M. (real property law, Hamburg) and Dr Malte Evers (employment law, Hamburg).

Stay informed

You don't want to miss any more of the latest legal developments? And be invited to our events? Then register here.